Growing Minneapolis: News from the City of Minneapolis Community Planning and Economic Development

City of Minneapolis sent this bulletin at 02/13/2017 11:20 AM CST

February 2017

CPED's Mission: Grow a vibrant, livable, safely built city for everyone.

Events

Winter Farmer’s Market

Saturday, February 259 am - 1:30 pm

Bachman’s Garden Center6010 Lyndale Ave. S.Minneapolis, MN 55419

Join local farmers, bakers, and artisans in the greenhouse at Bachman’s Garden Center for an indoor farmers market! Look for your favorite vendors from the Fulton, Kingfield, and Nokomis Markets as well as some who are unique to the indoor winter markets. There will be great music and wine and beer for sale by the glass. Come to the market and fill your tote bags with apples, root vegetables, squash, meats, cheeses, dried beans, honey, handmade items, and so much more!

Community Connections Conference

April 1, 2017 8 am - 3pm

Minneapolis Convention Center1301 2nd Ave SMinneapolis, MN 55403

The Neighborhood and Community Relations Department will host the 6th annual conference in partnership with City departments, neighborhood organizations, and community partners. It is designed to build successful community collaborations between neighborhoods, cultural communities, residents, and the City.

There will also be an opportunity to contribute to the third phase of the City's Comprehensive Plan, a document that shapes the future development of Minneapolis.

Sign up on the NCR email list to receive future updates and registration notification.

News

For folks who are used to bringing dogs along to Fair State and Sisyphus, or playing with them at Wild Mind Artisan Ales and Inbound, it may come as a shock that those pooches have been illicit stowaways all along. State law doesn't allow them in places that prepare food.

City Council members on Monday asked the Health Department to create some new regulations that would relax this outright ban. Dan Huff, the City’s director of environmental health, says that Minneapolis could get a variance on state law if it establishes certain rules, such as making sure the dogs are under control and leashed clear of the kitchen, and making sure staff have a cleanup plan for accidents.

Business Profile: North Market

Rendering of the soon-to-be North Market. Provided by: Pillsbury United Communities and LSE Architects

Currently, 67,000 North Minneapolis residents live over one
mile from a single supermarket, making North Minneapolis one of the country’s
largest federally designated food deserts. While this not only makes accessing
fresh fruit, vegetables and other healthy foods extremely difficult, a
supermarket can also provide a much-needed community-building space that the
area currently lacks. To address this need, Pillsbury
United Communities (PUC), a Minneapolis nonprofit, has spent years engaging
with North Minneapolis community members to develop the new North Market, an innovative grocery store
designed to increase access to nutritious food and wellness resources.

Located in a 15,000-square-foot former Kowalski’s at 4414
Humboldt Ave. N., North Market will provide the community with more than a
grocery store. Addressing the food, health and economic disparities in North
Minneapolis, North Market provides a three-piece solution that integrates
access to affordable food, health services and community wellness programs.
Through a partnership with North
Memorial Health Care, North Market will contain a walk-in clinic, pharmacy,
on-site dietician, community education classes and wellness programs.

North Market begins construction this spring with financing
from revenue bonds issued by the City and a redevelopment grant from the Minnesota Department of Employment and Economic
Development (DEED). Scheduled to
open in October 2017, North Market will bring an estimated 25 new grocery retail
positions, $3.6 million in annual revenue (with profits reinvested in
programming that benefits the community), and improvements to the overall
social, cultural and economic landscape of North Minneapolis.

Business Profile: Kente Circle

Larry Tucker, co-founder of Kente Circle

Larry Tucker, Licensed
Marriage and Family Therapist (LMFT), believes that many mental health challenges stem from societal pressures outside our control. Because of this, he is committed to ensuring
mental health providers recognize the unique challenges people of color experience,
particularly those related to cultural differences and racial trauma. In 2004, along with
fellow African American LMFT,
J. Phillip Rosier, Tucker founded Kente Circle, a mental health agency located at 345 East 38th Street in Minneapolis. Kente
Circle’s diverse staff provides culturally responsive therapy to individuals,
couples and families, especially those from historically underserved
populations including people of color, Native Americans, and the LGBTQ community.

In addition to serving
clients, Tucker
is transforming the way mental health
professionals see, talk about, and address race and other cultural differences
in their work. In 2015, he started Kente Circle Training Institute (KCTI), a nonprofit dedicated
to creating a more diverse and culturally responsive mental health workforce
and community. In addition to an
intensive yearlong internship program for students, KCTI offers trainings that
reach hundreds of helping professionals each year.

With support from the City
of Minneapolis Business Technical Assistance
Program (B-TAP)
provider Neighborhood Development Center (NDC), Tucker created an
expansion plan to connect KCTI to
Kente Circle’s current location. NDC and CPED staff helped Tucker navigate the
acquisition of Kente Circle’s neighboring lot and create a site plan. KCTI will house a first-floor training space and, if funds allow,
second-floor offices shared between Kente Circle and KCTI. To learn more about
KCTI and ways to support its work, contact Larry Tucker.

TechHire Profile: Yonas Gebrekristos

Last fall, the City of Minneapolis, Fairview Health Services and Augsburg University partnered to create MSP TechHire Scholars, a college internship program funded by Minneapolis-Saint Paul TechHire. The semester-long program connects diverse college students that are interested in Information Technology (IT) careers to paid, college-credited internships in Fairview Health Services’ IT department.

Augsburg junior Yonas Gebrekristos is a Management Information Sciences (MIS) major and Finance minor and one of six Augsburg students participating in the MSP TechHire Scholars program at Fairview.

Yonas says he’s drawn to an IT Career due to the rapidly growing industry and his love for helping people solve problems. His internship at Fairview has been a rewarding experience, allowing him to pick up new skills that he couldn’t in the classroom.

In the program, Yonas and his fellow interns are learning various computer programs, application
development, and professional skills. In addition, Fairview interns are
connected to mentors and individualized coaching as needed. Yonas says his
experience has not only solidified his interest in pursuing an IT profession,
but has prepared him for entering the professional workforce.

Renewing Business Licenses in Minneapolis is Easier Than Ever

Still from Somali translated Business Licensing video

CPED’s Business Licensing department recently added three
new instructional videos in Somali, Spanish and English to the Business Licensing
Information Program (BLIP). The videos
are quick descriptions of Business Licensing’s yearly renewal process using the City’s new licensing and permitting computer operating system. Learn how the City’s business licensing
renewal process has become faster and easier, leaving business owners more time
to run their businesses.

Check out the 2016 STEP-UP Final Report

STEP-UP is the City of Minneapolis youth employment program that recruits, trains, and places youth ages 14-21 with barriers to employment in jobs with Twin Cities businesses, nonprofits and public agencies.

In 2016, STEP-UP prepared over 2,000 Minneapolis youth – over 88% youth of color – with the skills needed to be successful in a job. Of those, 1,660 were matched with internships for the summer at one of 225 partner employers. The interns earned a combined $2.7 million in wages, $1.3 of which was paid directly by the private sector.

The banking industry led STEP-UP private sector employers in
2016, with U.S. Bancorp and Wells Fargo hiring a total of 61 interns. Other top
private sector employers were Excel Energy, Reve Academy and HealthPartners.

2017: A Big Year for Nicollet Mall Public Art

Not since 1992 has Nicollet Mall seen such an explosion in public art. Between now and next December, eight artworks will be installed on the Mall, including three new works and five returning works. The statue of the late Mary Tyler Moore will be returned to its original home at Nicollet Mall and 7th Street S. With six privately-owned pieces, and another work returning to the Mall in 2018, this urban open air gallery will feature a total of 15 artworks, and because some works are actually a series (over 90 artist-designed manhole covers), visitors who travel the 10 block span will experience 111 actual artist elements created over a 50 year period.

Seven Shadows of Spiritby Seitu Jones and Ta-coumba Aiken (pictured on the left) will return to the south end of the Mall, and this series will also grow in size, as Walker Art Center has commissioned seven new Shadows to be part of their renovated Sculpture Garden. At the north end of the Mall, Nimbus, by Tristan Al-Haddad (top photo) will act as a canopy for the outdoor theater in the round, which will serve future Mall events, including performances and library story time. For more updates and information on these projects, visit the Nicollet Mall public art blog.

Colin Kaepernick has pledged to give away a million dollars—$100,000 per month—to a variety of smaller organizations dedicated to helping oppressed communities. Some of these organizations don’t have the national presence of, say, Planned Parenthood or the ACLU, but they’re taking on the same problems at a smaller scale.

Most recently, Kaepernick donated $25,000 to an urban farming and food-education nonprofit in Minneapolis called Appetite for Change.Appetite for Change is a multi-layered organization; its goals are to encourage healthy eating and community growth in North Minneapolis.

Local restaurants joining the coalition of Small Business United Against Hate

Small business owners have a conundrum that cuts both ways: They don’t have the money or the clout to change laws or legislation the way big business does. All they have are their voices. But if they use their voices, certain customers could turn against them. Mike Sherwood of Pizza Nea put up an invitation on Twitter to gather at Pizza Nea after Tuesday’s march against Donald Trump’s ban on immigration.

Sherwood was shocked to see representatives from over 30 businesses show up, and the cause is growing. The mission of the coalition, thus far: "We are a group of Twin Cities small businesses against the rise of hatred being directed at the Muslim, Black, Latino, Immigrant, Disabled, and LGBTQ+ communities. We believe that Minnesota is only stronger when we embrace ALL people."

As Minneapolis booms, can the city preserve places where people actually make stuff?

If you look north from the corner of Malcolm Avenue SE and the University of Minnesota Transitway — the busway that runs between the U’s Minneapolis and St. Paul campuses — you can see one of Minneapolis’ largest industrial zones: the Southeast Minneapolis Industrial area, aka SEMI.

But if you turn just 90 degrees to the west, you can see what the area could become. Cranes and construction vehicles are visible at the site for “The Rise” — a mixed-use project that will hold 336 apartments and a grocery store on land that once held an ice cream factory, just the latest in a line of residential buildings that have been marching from the U of M campus toward Prospect Park.

Which poses something of a dilemma for Minneapolis: As residential development continues to boom, should the city allow the edges of its industrial areas to be turned over to housing, preserve them for uses that might provide jobs, or create something in between?

About this newsletterGrowing MPLS is published monthly by the City of Minneapolis Community Planning and Economic Development Department. If you have questions, please contact rose.lindsay@minneapolismn.gov.

For reasonable accommodations or alternative formats please contact Rose Lindsay at 612.673.5015. People who are deaf or hard of hearing can use a relay service to call 311 agents at 612-673-3000. TTY users can call 612-673-2157 or 612-673-2626.